This research interprets through the concept of nihilism the evolution of the Spanish interwar literature (1918-1936) and the central role of writers in recognizing the essential disorientation of modern man.First there is the analysis of the concept of nihilism. Then it is provided a description of the ideological and aesthetical context of interwar years, and it is discussed the position of avant-garde literature and the question of the joyfulness of the new art before a deep crisis of values. After that, I try to explain the interactions between new literature and nihilism and I analyze the change of sensibility from avant-gardism to revolution, and how writers react to several ideological alternatives: liberalism, religious thought and especially total proposals such as Fascism and Bolchevism. Finally I focus on the aesthetic ideology of the novelist Benjamín Jarnés, whose evolution shows how the artistic praxis posits itself as a mode of resistance to nihilism.